For my professional couetmpr I still run Windows XP, since my company requires it. On my personal couetmprs, however, I've run Ubuntu for about six months, and I'm very satisfied with it. Also, my girlfriend runs Ubuntu ever since her Windows XP installation crashed some months ago. She's very happy with it, even though Gnome is a bit different from both KDE and Windows.I'm actually surprised by how easy both setup and installation of new hardware is, comparing to what I've expected. I also like that the desktop version comes fully installed with OpenOffice, Firefox, Evolution and other applications that might come in handy.Ubuntu is truly a step towards Linux being a serious desktop alternative.

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== Tips and Tricks ==

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* To build your own .deb packages for Ubuntu you will need to install at least the following packages from the apt repositories:

* If you want to use a newer version of the driver than the one which comes with your distribution and you have ''linux-restricted-modules'' installed, you have to disable the fglrx kernel module from ''linux-restricted-modules'' because it will invariably get in the way of your more recent drivers. Detailed information on how to achieve this can be found in the distribution-specific guides.

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* You can configure the driver with the '''aticonfig''' tool, more information can be found at [[Configuring]].

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=== Old Version gets installed during update ===

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When updating a manual install - that is removing the old install and installing the new version -

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the old version might get installed again. This was observed starting with 8.10. If this happens it might help to remove the old version then delete the debian package files of the old version and run "sudo apt-get clean" before installing the new version. See the Ubuntu version dependent install documentation for instructions how to perform these steps. As soon as a new Catalyst version (current is 11.10 - as of Nov. 09, 2011) is available, these instructions might get updated.

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== Installation ==

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* [[Ubuntu Quantal Installation Guide| Quantal 12.10]]

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* [[Ubuntu Precise Installation Guide| Precise 12.04]]

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* [[Ubuntu Oneiric Installation Guide| Oneiric 11.10]]

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* [[Ubuntu Natty Installation Guide|Natty 11.04]]

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* [[Ubuntu Maverick Installation Guide|Maverick 10.10]]

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* [[Ubuntu Lucid Installation Guide|Lucid 10.04]]

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* [[Ubuntu Karmic Installation Guide|Karmic 9.10]]

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* [[Ubuntu Jaunty Installation Guide|Jaunty 9.04]]

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* [[Ubuntu Intrepid Installation Guide|Intrepid 8.10]]

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* [[Ubuntu Hardy Installation Guide|Hardy 8.04]]

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* [[Ubuntu Gutsy Installation Guide|Gutsy 7.10]]

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* [[Ubuntu Feisty Installation Guide|Feisty 7.04]]

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* [[Ubuntu Edgy Installation Guide|Edgy 6.10]]

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* [[Ubuntu Dapper Installation Guide|Dapper 6.04]]

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* [[Ubuntu Breezy Installation Guide|Breezy 5.10]]

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== Unsupported adapter ==

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Specific notes for Radeon HD 6xxx cards with no official support yet (see [[Hardware#Not_Yet_Supported_or_Unoffically_Supported]]).

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After installing the fglrx module, you might get the following message when trying to configure X through aticonfig:

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aticonfig: No supported adapters detected

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Also you might see that the fglrx module has not been used by Xorg (no line saying ‘‘LoadModule: "fglrx"’’ in /var/log/Xorg.0.log). Also on my system I had segmentation faults from the ati Catalyst Control Center (amdcccle).

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At this stage, do not panic! This does not necessarily imply a problem with the module, indeed your card may be not officially supported. Numerous reports on forums show that users end up using the drivers successfully anyway, e.g. for an HD 6850 card (BARTS codename). To force Xorg to load the driver for fglrx anyway, just manually create a minimal xorg.conf file, as suggested on this wiki (follow the tutorials). The module should then load and everything else should (hopefully) work. (On my system even the Catalyst Control Center was working at that point.) Except you have the "Unsupported hardware" mark on a corner of the screen, but that is another problem... (Forum users report they have been able to get rid of this as well, although caution should be used as the hack scripts seem not to work with version 11.1 of the Catalyst drivers.)

Revision as of 23:03, 29 September 2012

Contents

Tips and Tricks

To build your own .deb packages for Ubuntu you will need to install at least the following packages from the apt repositories:

build-essential

fakeroot

dh-make

debconf

execstack

dh-modaliases

Moreover for latest releases, the following package simplifies module installation:

dkms

If you want to use a newer version of the driver than the one which comes with your distribution and you have linux-restricted-modules installed, you have to disable the fglrx kernel module from linux-restricted-modules because it will invariably get in the way of your more recent drivers. Detailed information on how to achieve this can be found in the distribution-specific guides.

You can configure the driver with the aticonfig tool, more information can be found at Configuring.

Old Version gets installed during update

When updating a manual install - that is removing the old install and installing the new version -
the old version might get installed again. This was observed starting with 8.10. If this happens it might help to remove the old version then delete the debian package files of the old version and run "sudo apt-get clean" before installing the new version. See the Ubuntu version dependent install documentation for instructions how to perform these steps. As soon as a new Catalyst version (current is 11.10 - as of Nov. 09, 2011) is available, these instructions might get updated.

Unsupported adapter

After installing the fglrx module, you might get the following message when trying to configure X through aticonfig:

aticonfig: No supported adapters detected

Also you might see that the fglrx module has not been used by Xorg (no line saying ‘‘LoadModule: "fglrx"’’ in /var/log/Xorg.0.log). Also on my system I had segmentation faults from the ati Catalyst Control Center (amdcccle).

At this stage, do not panic! This does not necessarily imply a problem with the module, indeed your card may be not officially supported. Numerous reports on forums show that users end up using the drivers successfully anyway, e.g. for an HD 6850 card (BARTS codename). To force Xorg to load the driver for fglrx anyway, just manually create a minimal xorg.conf file, as suggested on this wiki (follow the tutorials). The module should then load and everything else should (hopefully) work. (On my system even the Catalyst Control Center was working at that point.) Except you have the "Unsupported hardware" mark on a corner of the screen, but that is another problem... (Forum users report they have been able to get rid of this as well, although caution should be used as the hack scripts seem not to work with version 11.1 of the Catalyst drivers.)